Dog Treat Businesses Flourish In Connecticut

JOSEPH A. O'BRIEN JR.

Two Connecticut companies know what your dog wants. They've got it.

Two Connecticut companies are thriving on the premise that nothing is too good for man's best friends.

Walk By Faith Doggie Bakery LLC in East Hampton, which sells dog and cat treats, and Miller Foods Inc., which sells raw dog and cat food under the Oma's Pride label, have carved out enviable positions in the highly competitive pet food market. Their companies are among the 23 purveyors of pet treats in Connecticut licensed as required by the state Department of Agriculture.

"I don't look for stores, they look for me," a grinning Kimberly Roy, owner and operator of Walk By Faith, said during an interview at Higher Grounds coffeehouse in East Hampton village, where she first sold the baked dog treats from a cookie jar three years ago.

Roy said she uses only natural ingredients in her baked treats that she flavors with various foods and spices, including peanut butter, cheese, rosemary and thyme. She has been selling the treats at area fairs, including the Big E in Springfield, and through East Hampton-area stores including Paul's & Sandy's Too garden shop in East Hampton and Anderson's Feed and Grain and the Yankee Boat Yard, both in Portland. She's also recently placed her treats with Whole Foods in Glastonbury.

The name Walk By Faith has special meaning for Roy, who describes herself as a devout Christian. She chose the name from a passage in the Bible — 2 Corinthians, 5:7 — that reads in part "…for we walk by faith, not by sight …" The citation is on each package of treats.

"I don't know how it's gotten so big, so fast," Roy said of what began as a hobby in her East Hampton kitchen and now involves a number of bakers, delivery people and a network of friends and store owners. The treats are baked daily and hand-packaged to ensure freshness. Roy takes pride in knowing the ingredients in her treats can be found in the average kitchen. "I have people eat these all the time."

Although the folks at Millers Foods can say the same about the kitchen, they stop short of including Oma's Pride raw products in the human diet until after they are cooked.

Millers Foods is a fourth-generation, family-operated business started in 1952 by Margaret and Earl Miller, who sold poultry and eggs to families and businesses in Avon. For years, the family raised and sold turkeys, reaching roughly 14,000 a year, for the holidays.

The company launched the Oma's Pride raw pet food products division in 2001. It was named Oma, which is German for grandmother, to honor the memory of family matriarch Margaret Miller. The company has added O'Paws, a line of freeze-dried food products made in-house for dogs and cats.

Raw animal food is not readily endorsed by the Food and Drug Administration, which sets the rules for all foods in the United States, human or animal, but the Millers have a handle on safe-handling practices stemming from their years of processing turkeys and are inspected regularly by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The Millers began looking into raw feeding after a family dog, Harley, became sick when it was just over 4 years old. With the change in diet, Harley's health improved and he lived 10 more years. The business thrived, too. Oma's Pride products are shipped to nearly every state and worldwide to destinations that include Hong Kong and Great Britain.

Carolyn Miller-Stevens, a daughter of the founders, said the company strives to live up to its name.